The Human School Project
by Icewine Rose
Summary: Bernard has been selected to go to a humans house in a student-exchange program setup...but with a girl! But what happens with the girl's dead mother ends up being a target of Jack Frost? BernardxOC Rated T for some language only. R&R please!
1. Prologue: 9 Years Earlier

**Prologue**

_**9 Years Earlier**_

_88_ _years_. He had been searching for _88_ years and Santa's accursed magic was keeping him from reaching her. Jack pulled the picture of them together when they were organizing the _Snowlace_ _Ball_ from his pocket. Melody was wearing the familiar carefree smile. She was holding a roll of baby blue cloth trimmed in white, that was nearly as tall as herself, with one arm wrapped around it. The other was sweeping her long dark blonde hair out of her face. To her right, he saw himself as he used to be: happy, smiling, and content with his position. He felt the old grin tugging at the corners of his mouth as the memories of her gasps of amazement at the elves' latest creation of a color picture taker. The smallest of discernible grins was creeping up on his face as he pulled the small, elegant, light blue, snowflake shaped ring from the coat pocket closest to his chest. The memory of the grin quickly disappeared as flashes of his last meeting came without permission into view. The ice pond, the bench, his offer…her refusal. Tears quickly turned to small icicles halfway down his face as he finally pulled out what he was scared to open, yet needed to desperately. He needed to _know_.

The letter in question was ordinary looking enough to the ignorant passerby. White as the snow falling around Jack, the stamp was what caught his eye. He let out a gasp the first time he saw it, surprised at who had written it and that she still had the stamps he had bought her so many years ago. Midnight blue background with a single, complicated snowflake. With trembling hands he opened it, and couldn't help but give a small gasping laugh at all the memories of Melody's graceful fingers brutally murdering any envelope she needed to open. His hands couldn't hold the letter he pulled out steady. He laid it on the ground and held it down with one trembling finger, and read:

_Dear New Santa,_

_I'm _really_ sorry this letter is so belated. I usually get it in much sooner! But I've been really busy with homeschooling my daughter, Katie (it's really 'Catherine', but we call her that for short), that I honestly couldn't get to this any sooner. _

_By now, you probably have heard about me. I was one of the first ones, if you get my drift. But there are many details about me that I, Marcus (my husband), or the Council of Legendary Figures need to explain to you. If you don't get to it soon, nothing is going to explode. It's really more for purely emergency situations that we tell you. I can't put my address on here for reasons that I (or the others mentioned above) need to explain, but not here. It would tear my family apart if it got out. And something _will_ explode if that is not addressed with the utmost security. _

_Before you try, don't ask any of the elves, even the Head-Elf, about me. None of them know I'm even alive. Really. Many of the older ones even attended my funeral! But all will be explained. _

_I suggest that the _quickest_ way is to ask the C.L.F. For the most detailed of _why_ come to me. Nothing's stopping you from using both, however. Hear from you soon!_

_~Melody Michieles_

_P.S. Also inside is a picture of me and my husband and daughter. That's it!_

_~M.M._

Jack pulled the unnoticed picture from the crushed envelope in his hand. The crumpled picture showed a glowing Melody and _"Marcus! That thieving son of a bitch. And his bastard child. Look at it," _and he himself looked at it really for the first time. Catherine looked much like her mother, with her dirty blonde hair, spring green eyes, gold and silver cheek sparkles… he closed his eyes and knelt down completely in the snow.

The tears that spilled out now were so hot, they fell all the way down his face. They never did that before. The only one that ever could do that was Melody.

Unwelcome thoughts flashed through his mind as he knelt in the forest, so close to her home he could count the miles with his hands. Her home, which she built with _Marcus_ instead of him. Had a daughter with _Marcus_. Never spared a thought for him in the exact reverse of his thoughts for her.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!" he screamed to the trees around him, his fists hitting the ground in front on him hard. As soon as his hands made contact with the July Texas soil, the small mini storm that he put around him grew. It grew and grew, to the point that he, the center was so minuscule, he didn't count anymore against the huge raging storm that covered the whole state and some besides.

And on the beach, hundreds of miles away from the spot Jack thought they were, the Michieles family hid in the car, wearing only the T-shirts, bathing suits, shorts, and flip-flops that they thought they needed for a summer trip to the coast. Melody shivered harder than any of them as the threesome waited the storm out.

Had Jack stayed, he would have seen them return home, Melody still shivering and coughing hard. Had he stayed even longer, he would have seen the ambulance drive quickly in and out. But he didn't. Leaving his monster storm, Jack slowly and deliberately stomped off, wearing the satisfied sneer that he would make infamous along with him.


	2. Chapter 1: The Letter

**Chapter 1**

_**The Letter**_

"Why are you so glum?" Abby asked Bernard when she came into his room, delivering, as usual, the best hot chocolate available anywhere in the world. Abby meant it as a joke, but Bernard didn't seem to take it as one. He just shook his head, then put it into his right hand. Abby looked at him quizzically, putting her hot cocoa tray down on the table in the middle of the room.

"O.K." she mouthed, walking over to him. She put out a hand to his shoulder, but before her finger was able to even tap it, Bernard shot up again, who was obviously not expecting her there. "Sorry, Abby." he said, seeing he almost hit her. "What's wrong, Bernard?" she asked, now a bit worried.

"I got into that 'Human-School' project thing. It wouldn't be so bad if I hadn't gotten a girl...in _South Texas!_" he emphasized the last two words. Abby flinched a little bit. Elves were sensitive to heat (hence their presence in the North Pole) but some elves were even more sensitive than others. Bernard was one of these elves.

Abby stood there as if in thought for a moment, then asked, to help lighten the mood, "Is it your partner being a girl

that's terrible, or is it that it's in South Texas?"

"Both…and more."

"Oh? What would that more be?"

"You know that Santa's wife's about to have a baby. He's gonna need me here."

"Isn't he going to leave Cu-"

"Yes," Bernard hissed, his face screwing up. "That's probably the worst part of it."

Abby smiled at the infamous fighting and squabbling between him and Curtis playing a role even now, in infuriating him, three years after Curtis was taken in on the job as #2 elf. She knew that this was a serious thing for Bernard, but she just couldn't take this seriously herself. "Have you asked Santa to back you out?" she suggested with a smile. Bernard glared at her, angry that she wasn't more sympathetic to what he was going through, but answered her question anyway. "Yes, but he refused. I'm in it for the whole _year_."

Abby thought it would be best to start actually _helping_ Bernard with his "problem", bit her lip and suggested, "Well then, let's stop looking at the bad points and pick out the good ones. Let's start with her name. What is it?"

"Katie! You got a letter from…Alaska_?_" her dad called from the bottom of the stairs. At the word "Alaska" and "letter", Katie pulled the earphones from her _ever-slightly_ pointed ears, and slammed the Mac book she had on her desk shut. "The Santa Clause 2" movie could wait for at least the little while that it would take to read the letter. She had seen the movie so much that she could probably leave it running, and she could just start watching from wherever it happened to be. The only other thing that she could do something like that with would be the "Les Misérables" soundtrack, which she had listened to since she was about six years old.

She skipped into the kitchen, where her dad was starting to prepare dinner. "Hey, Dad. Where's my letter?" she asked. "It's over where the letters always are." He nodded in the direction of the side table, where a small pile of mail was sitting, and a white envelope, decorated with red, green, and gold snaking lines around the border, was placed on the top. It read "To: Catherine Michieles", then their address. She picked it up, and read the return address. If it was because it was _again_ asking her if she wanted to go on a student-exchange program with a student in Canada or Alaska, she would have to send it back, as she was homeschooled. But this time, it wasn't from a student-exchange program. Rather, it just read "Alaska," and that was it. No name, nor any other address than that.

Curious of the festive decoration and lack of appropriate address, she went and got a butter knife from the drawer. Unlike her dad, she didn't have the knack of opening letters with her fingers cleanly. She had the knack for brutally murdering the envelope, instead. Once she got it open, she took out a piece of parchment. Yes, it was parchment, not paper. It was too fancy and too thick to be considered just a piece of paper. Getting over that fact and more of the decorative Christmasy border that lined the parchment, she actually began to read the letter itself:

_Dear Catherine Michieles, _(Katie was impressed. The whole thing seemed to be done in handwritten calligraphy.)

_You have been chosen to host a guest from an Alaskan school for one year. After that year is done, you may take the choice of visiting his _(Katie noticed the lack of "/her" after this,) _school for one year, or declining the invitation. He will give you the address upon his arrival. As said in a previous letter, _(_"What previous letter?"_ Katie thought,) _once you have sent in the application saying "yes," or "no," there is no backing out. Your partner will meet you at your house on the 28__th__ of December. Once there, he will be sure to burn the slip of paper that contains your address. _(_"Where the hell did they get my address?"_)_ Thank you, and have a Merry Christmas._

_Yours sincerely,_

_S.C._

"_S.C.? Who's that supposed to be? Santa Claus?" _Katie thought, half feeling like laughing, half like screaming her head off.

"Who's it from, Katie?" her dad asked, chopping up some mushrooms and dropping them into a pan of very hot oil. "Someone named 'S.C.' He said I'm going to host a visitor from some random Alaskan school for a year."

"A year? Wow. If they're going to stay that long, then I'm guessing that you're room is just going to get messy after the first week." Her dad responded, though cutting up something relatively small with a very big sharp knife, paying attention to everything Katie was telling him. Those three things were what Katie loved about her dad the most: 1. That he could deal with the weirdest scenarios with ease and a touch of comedy, 2. That he could multitask like nobody's business, and last but not least, 3. He was an amazing cook.

"But we are gonna have to figure out where they're gonna sleep. In your room perhaps? I could set up the cot."

"A _boy_ sleeping in my room for a year? Are you nuts?" Katie nearly shouted. Her dad's eyebrows went up in the smallest increment possible. "You didn't tell me he was going to be a boy. But where else are we gonna put him? I'll set up the divider in your room so that you can lock it at night."

Katie held back a groan, running her fingers through her dirty-blonde hair. That was one of the flips sides that Katie _didn't _like about her dad: once he's made up his mind, nothing, _absolutely nothing _was going to change it. The other thing was he didn't seem to get the uneasiness teenagers these days had about the opposing sex. Especially if they involved things like sleeping in the same room, divider or not.

That started to get Katie wondering, _"How old is he? What's his name?" _As if in answer to her question, the discarded envelope in her left hand suddenly felt slightly heavier, as if she forgot to take something out of it.

"_Weird. I could've sworn that the letter was the only thing in there. Oh, well." _she thought. Things like that seemed to happen to her a lot. Much more so since her Mom died. That was the parent that she looked most like, with her spring green eyes, lightly tanned skin, brownish blonde hair, and the two coolest things that she loved about her appearance: her semi-pointed ears and the very small, so small as to the point of nearly being unnoticeable, silver and gold sparkles on her cheeks. She probably wouldn't have loved them as much as she did, if she went to public school, like most kids. Instead, her dad homeschooled her, and as far as Katie knew, doing a damn good job of it too.

But as common as these weird sudden appearances of things that weren't there before was to her, she still was curious as to whatever was still in the envelope. Thankful that she didn't have to open it again, she pulled out another piece of parchment. This one was slightly more beaten up, with no decorations, but when Katie read it, it held the most important information about this whole "Alaskan student" thing so far. It read:

_Dear Katie, _(she noted the use of her nickname, and saw that this was written in elegant cursive handwriting, not in calligraphy. _"Whoever this guy is, he seems to know a lot about me." _Katie didn't know what to think about this.)

_I'm sorry if you read the other letter first, and were a little bit freaked out. That one's the letter that I _have _to send in order to be sure that I've given all the information. Unfortunately, that doesn't do its job very well, hence this letter. That letter always leaves out the most important information that you could possibly know about this whole experience…the name and age of the other person. His name is Bernard and he's 16 years old. If you're wondering about last names, I'm not allowed to give it. And don't worry, he doesn't know yours either. He's still going to meet you at your house on the 28__th__ of December, and nothing else in the other letter has changed because of this one. This is kind of an extension. Thank you again, and have a very Merry Christmas._

_See you soon,_

_S. Calvin_

"_Hmm. S. Calvin. That would be really funny, and weird if his first name's Scott. And on top of that, the boy that's coming to visit is named Bernard. Like in "The Santa Clause" movies." _Katie thought as she walked back upstairs to her room, reading the letter as she went. _ "It would be totally awesome if it were real. But I'm old enough to know that the North Pole isn't real. Yeah, sure elves are real. I'm living proof of that, but not the North Pole."_


	3. Chapter 2: The Red Shirt

3

By Icewine Rose

**Chapter 2**

_**The Red Shirt**_

"_I'm gonna miss this room." _Bernard thought, as he looked around his room for one last time before he teleported to…oh, what was her name…_"Was it Cathy, Caitlyn…Catherine! That was it!" _Before he teleported to Catherine's house. Right now, he was incredibly thankful for Abby. She had made him much less anxious than he usually would be in this instance. _"Even though she had laughed at me at first."_

"Hey, Bernard."

Bernard rolled his eyes. "Hello, Curtis."

"Santa wanted me to tell you something."

Bernard turned around, resisting the temptation to swing his suitcase around his body, which he was holding in his right hand. He always tried to act as mature as possible around Curtis in such a way that could only be described as an older sibling trying to show his friends his superiority over his little brother.

"What, Curtis?" he asked, in his usual "oh, really?" tone that he used when talking to Curtis.

"He said be sure to teleport not a few blocks away from her house, but at the end of her driveway, and that his instructions would make sense when you actually get there." Curtis said, crossing his arms in front of him. "And before you ask, I didn't nominate you."

"Excuse me?"

"I didn't nominate you."

"For what?"

"This," Curtis waved his hand around the air in front of him as he said this, "human thing."

"What makes you think I'll believe you?" Bernard asked skeptically.

"I don't want you to go."

Bernard dropped his suitcase. It was true that he thought Curtis had nominated him, but Curtis seemed genuine in what he was saying. Bernard didn't know what it was that made him seem truthful this time, and not all the other times. Maybe it was his partly scared, partly worried, and partly confused look on his face. Maybe it was that Curtis had stayed to talk to him after he had delivered Santa's message.

"I'm…well…kinda scared. I don't think I'm up to it." Curtis said, shifting his feet as he was staring at them. "The Pole is always running so smoothly with this Santa, but a lot of it is you. And most of the stuff you do isn't anywhere in the 'Santa Handbook'." He looked up to see Bernard fighting back a smile.

"Curtis," he laughed, "if you ever tell anyone that I said this, I will kill you, but you're really good at leading." Curtis' arms dropped from their fold. "And it's not as if _you're _going to deliver the baby yourself. Everything's going to be fine." Bernard finished, wearing a smile, and patting Curtis on the shoulder. Curtis cracked a smile himself.

"Bye, Bernard."

"Bye, Curtis." And he was gone. Curtis stood there for a second, then whispered, "Thank you."

Expecting to see a suburb, or at least a city surrounding when he finished his split second transporting, the number of trees and the sudden dirt road on his right startled him enough to almost make him fall over.

"_I must be at the wrong…oh."_ Looking down the dirt road, he saw, hidden behind some trees, a white, two-story house. _"This must have been what Santa was talking about. Thank goodness that he did. If I had landed even a block away, I would have gotten lost."_ He looked down the driveway, as he realized that it was now, and saw that it was quite a walk. Making sure that his telltale ears were hidden either under his hair or beneath his hat, he started walking.

Katie loved having visitors, even if they were people she didn't particularly like or were being forced upon her. Bernard's visit was even more enjoyable than most, because her dad didn't make her clean the house, as he usually did. But, considering if her father _had _told her to clean up everything, she still would be sitting in the window seat of the game room on the top story, waiting to see him walk down the driveway, so she could go out and greet him.

"_And even though _I _may not want him here, that doesn't give me an excuse to make his stay miserable. Might as well make the most of it. Oh! He's here!"_

She jumped up suddenly, and sprinting down the hallway, charging down the stairs, and bursting the front door open, she ran out to the tall boy that was walking halfway down the driveway. He was holding a dark brown suitcase, and he had a tan leather bag over his right shoulder. He had dark, dark and extraordinarily curly hair, most of which was covered by a…was it black, or green…hat. Once he caught sight of her, he stopped walking in the blankest looking part of the driveway, making him look very small from the slight distance that Katie was at. His shirt was a very dark, deep red with shiny gold embroidery, the thread being the same color as her golden cheek sparkles.

"Hi," she said, breathlessly. She wasn't very athletic, and just a very little running made her quite out of breath. Bernard seemed stunned at her odd greeting patterns. "Nice shirt. Love the color." she added, seeing that he wasn't saying anything. They both stood there in the chilly air, when Katie suddenly put her hand out, making Bernard jump back a bit from surprise. "Catherine Michieles, but you can call me Katie. You must be Bernard."

"Yes," he answered, warily, taking her hand and shaking it. Seeing Bernard's uneasiness, Katie's smile faded, not completely, but very rapidly, to a much lower level of happiness.

"You don't seem too happy to be here." she pointed out.

"Nope. I didn't choose to come here." he said, a smile spreading across his face. It wasn't that the situation was particularly funny, but Katie's constant smiling, even after disappointment, made his mouth _want _to twitch up.

"Good. We're on the same page."

"Excuse me?" Bernard was confused. He was expecting her to be really disappointed that he wasn't as eager as she seemed to be. But this was the complete opposite.

At his confused expression, the smile grew larger than it was before. "I was forced to have you by a letter. But, just because neither of us don't want to do this, it doesn't mean we shouldn't _try_ to enjoy our predicament."

The smile came onto Bernard's face of his own accord now. "I agree with you there-"

"Good!" Katie interrupted, grabbing his left hand, which was still holding the slip of paper that held her address, added "Now, let me show you where you're going to sleep," then began pulling him to the house.

"_This is getting weirder and weirder every minute! Not only is he named 'Bernard', he _LOOKS_ like him from the movies!" _she thought, sitting on her bed, watching Bernard unpack his suitcase. The only bit of anything she did that was _remotely_ like cleaning up, was that she cleared out the extra dresser she had in her unusually large room. Her dad had set up the cot for her the day before, being about as big as a normal full-sized bed.

Bernard wasn't paying much attention to what he was unpacking, as he was looking around at Katie's huge room.

"Why's your room so big? You're an only child aren't you?" he asked, accidentally picking up Katie's favorite pink sweater and placing it in the dresser.

Katie bit her lip and answered, with a very strained laugh, "My mom was going to have another baby, but it miscarried, and we had already built a new house. The baby and me were going to share this room, but my parents agreed that we should each have _some _privacy, so they put in the divider." At this point, she got up and half-pulled the divider out to show him. "And when it's closed, you can still get to the bathroom through that door," she pointed to the door closest to him. Then she walked past him to the dresser. Bernard's face, all the while, had quickly changed from confoundment, to impressed, then back to confounded again. But the best expression Katie ever saw on his face before or since, was when she pulled out her sweater and a green sundress from the dresser, and he turned bright pink, matching the sweater in her hand, for making such a silly mistake. Katie just laughed, then started putting Bernard's clothes into the dresser. He quickly began unpacking with her, thankful for her help. _"Why did I react like that? I don't react like that, even when _Curtis _is present!" _Looking up, he was able to see Katie's small sparkles on her cheeks. His eyes flittered up to her ears, but they were covered by her long, shoulder length hair.

"Are you wearing make-up?" he asked, before he could stop himself. Katie looked up at him, wearing an odd, neutral face. "No," she answered, her right eyebrow going up. "Why?"

"Just curious." Bernard said, trying to dismiss his second mistake.

"Do I look like I'm wearing make-up?" she asked, a mischievous smile spreading across her face. Bernard didn't see it, though. He was blushing again, looking down and quickly shoving clothes into the dresser.

Katie thought it would be best to leave that conversation at that, and picked up the red shirt he was wearing earlier. Once he got here, her dad had insisted that he should get freshened up after such a long journey, so he sent him upstairs. He took a very quick shower, and changed into similar black pants, and a long-sleeved emerald green shirt that matched his hat (which Katie found out was actually green, not black).

"_Hmm. This shirt is uncannily like the one Bernard was wearing in the second movie." _

Bernard looked up, seeing her staring intently at his shirt. "Anything wrong with it?" he asked, making Katie jump slightly. Laughing and putting a hand to her chest, she answered, "No, it's just a nice shirt. I like the red color."

"It's maroon."

"No, it's red."

"Well, I think it's maroon."

"Well, you think wrong. It's red."

"Maro-"

"Dinner time!" Katie's dad called from the bottom of the stairs, making both of them jump, and then end their argument there.

"_At least for now." _they both thought, wearing smiles as they went downstairs.


	4. Chapter 3: Gold and Silver Sparkles

**Chapter 3**

_**Gold and Silver Sparkles**_

"Maroon," Bernard playfully hissed across the dinner table, as Katie was swallowing a mouthful of peas. Another mischievous grin inched its way along her face.

"Red," she whispered back. By now, her dad had heard, and was looking at the two with a mixture of bewilderment and amusement.

"Maroon,"

"Red!"

"It's maroon! There's too much purple in it to be considered red!"

"Purple's got red in it, smartso. It's red!"

"What's red?" Katie's dad asked, now wanting to know what they were talking about.

"Maroon," Bernard corrected.

"Fine, what's either maroon or red?"

"His shirt," Katie answered.

Taking a quick look at Bernard, her father looked back at Katie and said, "Well, you're both wrong." Katie and Bernard looked at him with stunned looks.

"It's green!"

"Not _that _shirt, Dad!"

"Which shirt then?"

"The one I was wearing earlier."

"Oh…well then, I have to agree with Bernard."

"Dad!"

"It's maroon with gold embroidery!"

"Bronze," Bernard corrected Katie's dad for the second time. Katie half groaned and half laughed as she put her head into her right hand.

"Gold. It's golden thread, Bernard," she said, shaking her head, which was still in her hand.

"Bronze! Maroon with bronze thread!"

"Red with gold!"

"Maroon with bronze!"

"It's just a shirt!" Katie's dad interrupted their argument again. "I don't need you at each other's throats like this all year! I'll go insane!"

Both arguers lowered their heads to their plates. Bernard just stared, and Katie poked at her meat with her fork. After a few minutes, Bernard started eating. The dinner progressed on silently, and when most attendants were very close to finishing the meal, Katie's dad got up and left the table. Katie herself looked up at Bernard as soon as her dad was out of earshot. Bernard saw her move out of the corner of his eye.

"_Huh. Maybe she's going to admit that it's stupid to fight over something as trivial as the color of my shirt."_ He looked up though, not to a defeated face, as he expected, but one that was trying to feign it…unsuccessfully.

"Bernard," she asked, maliciously.

"What?" he answered in a similar fashion as he would to Curtis.

"Red and gold."

"Sorry that I didn't clear off the top of the table for you, Bernard. I just couldn't find another place for them." Katie said through the divider, as both changed from their clothes into sleepwear. Bernard's new _maroon_ pajamas that matched his shirt gave him that weird, stiff "new clothes" feeling. Elves didn't have to sleep every night, like humans did, but only about once every two or three months. Some of the other elves at the North Pole _did _own sleepwear or nightgowns, but they rarely used them (even taking into consideration how little they would need them). Most of them, though, were like Bernard, and just slept in the clothes they had on. _"This is going to be very interesting. Santa didn't tell me if I had to go to sleep every night, or if I could fake it, and wait until she was asleep. I guess he didn't think that I would be sleeping in the same room. Either that, or he thought I could figure it out on my own."_

"Hello? Are you still alive?" Katie asked through the divider, when he didn't answer in a reasonable amount of time.

"Excuse me?" he answered, shaking himself out of his thoughts.

"I'm sorry that I didn't clear the top of the dresser off!" Katie said, louder, stressing each syllable. "I couldn't find another place for my pictures!"

"Okay, okay," he said, "I get it!" He could hear her stifled giggling. "I probably wouldn't have used it anyway." This wasn't completely true, but he didn't want to hurt his hostess' feelings. As he was pulling on his sleep shirt, he looked over at the dresser in question. There were framed photographs on every inch of it. Looking more closely at it, he saw in most of them, Katie was with either her dad, or a woman who looked a lot like her. _"That must be her mom. She's really familiar. Where have I seen that woman before?"_ In one of the pictures of Katie's family at the beach, he noticed that both her and her mother had gold and silver sparkles on their cheeks. What surprised him more, though, was that the woman's ears were pointed. He picked up the photograph and examined it more closely.

"I'm opening the divider, alright?" Katie called through it.

"Okay." Bernard said, quickly putting the picture back down on the dresser. It fell over, knocking down several other pictures with it, as Katie pushed the divider halfway into the wall.

"My pictures!" she cried, laughing as Bernard tried to put the pictures back up, only to knock more down.

"Sorry," he mumbled, blushing again. He could hear Katie giggling and walking closer. "Don't worry about them," she chuckled, taking his hand off the pictures. "They never stay up anyway." She looked up at him, just in time to see him blush more.

"You blush a lot," she noted, lifting a hand to his bright pink cheek. Katie didn't think she was flirting, but…then again, she never thought that she was flirting. It was just in her nature to do things like this. She moved some of his curls from the right side of his face.

"Hey," Bernard tried to duck his head out of the way, unsuccessfully. It only made her hand slide up to the tip of his ear. It was only for less than half a second, but Katie's hand felt the point. She gasped, then pulled her hand back to her chest.

"What?" Bernard asked, worried that she realized his nonhumanhood.

"N-nothing," she stammered, her eyes searching his now pale cheeks for silver or gold sparkles. She found them as he quickly stood up, the light hitting them in _just _the right way to make them shimmer.

"_Oh my gosh! He's an elf! A real elf!"_ she thought, then, to change the subject, quickly added, "Uh…what time do you want to get up tomorrow?"

Bernard, who was expecting to hear what Katie had been thinking, was startled. "About 7 in the morning, but what about-"

"Are you wearing make-up, Bernard?" she asked, acting playfully like an interrogator.

"Excuse me?"

"Are you wearing make-up?"

"No, why-" he began, warily. _"I think I can see where this is going."_

"Then why are your cheeks so sparkly?"

Bernard's already pale face lost all the color it had left. _"Oh no! She knows I'm an elf!"_

Katie laughed, making Bernard both angry and confused. It wasn't an evil laugh, as one might expect someone to use when they've figured out a piece of _very _important information, but Katie's just sounded like she was just laughing at the fact he was blushing.

"Don't look so scared, Bernard! I'm half-elf myself!"

Bernard fell down onto the floor with a loud _THUD_!


	5. Chapter 4: The Divider

**Chapter 4**

_**The Divider**_

Katie watched the sleeping Bernard through the half open divider from her bed, resting her head in her hands.

"_I wonder if I'm the only half-elf in the world. The way he reacted, it seems that the only people he's heard of are full humans and full elves," _she sat, waiting for the alarm to go off. She couldn't sleep all that night, thinking about the conversation they had after they revealed who each other truly were. Sort of.

"_I know I sound like I'm just being stubborn and stupid, but I still can't believe that the North Pole is real. I think he's just seen the movies and is acting like Bernard to mess with my head. I don't think he knew that it's my favorite movie on the face of this earth, but still, who hasn't seen it?"_

She glanced over at her clock and sighed. It read "5:30 A.M.". The sun was _just _coming up over the sunrise. _"I thought he said that elves didn't need to sleep much. That would explain why I can pull all-nighters for two weeks before I get tired. I wonder if I should try waking him up."_

She tentatively got up and walked over to the cot. She gingerly sat down next to him on it, and put her hand out to tap his shoulder. She pulled it back quickly though, suddenly having second thoughts. This pattern repeated, till her clock read "6:00 A.M." _Finally _picking up enough courage, she lightly placed her hand on his shoulder.

"Bernard," she whispered, shaking his shoulder delicately. Bernard said something in his sleep in response. Katie screwed her face up in annoyance. _"Now I'm not sure I believe him about not sleeping a lot."_

She looked around at her window. It was much lighter now, but it would still be a good full hour before her alarm went off.

"_I think I'll go take a shower and change into some clothes. By then, Bernard will be up, and we can go down and open some more presents. Oh!" _she smacked her forehead. _"I don't have a present for him! Wait…"_ She began rummaging around her room, quietly, as not to wake him up.

The first thing she paused at was a necklace. It was gold, and had a heart locket pendant on the end of it. _"He _was _wearing a necklace when he first got here. But I can't give him this one,"_ she opened it to see a picture of her on one side, and a picture of another girl of similar age, but with raven-black hair and light brown eyes. _"Cecilia just gave this to me this year for Christmas! And she is my best friend," _she clasped the necklace around her neck, then continued rummaging.

"_Hmm…what about…this?"_ she pulled out a teddy bear that was wearing a Santa hat.

"_No, that'd be stupid."_ she thought, tossing it somewhere behind her, then walking out of the room. _"Maybe I'll find something in the Game Room."_

"Ow!" Something hit Bernard's head, waking him from his sleep. It wasn't hard, but was soft, kinda like a pillow. "Katie, why did you have to-" he was cut short in his angry and slurred speech when he realized that Katie wasn't in the room with him.

"_Where'd she go? What time is it?"_ he thought as he looked around for her or her alarm clock. She said that she would wake him up at 7. He found her clock on the bedside table. It read "6:35 A.M.". _"Oh, I guess that both of us woke up a bit early. I wonder what she went to do. Wow, can you believe it, a half-elf! Who thought that they existed? I might as well get dressed while she's gone. It doesn't take very long for me to dress anyway." _He turned to the extra dresser, and knocked off the projectile that had woken him up in the first place onto the floor. Looking down on the floor, he saw that it was a teddy bear, wearing a scarlet red Santa hat.

"_Odd. Why was this flying though the air, and why was it flying towards me? Kinda cute. It would make a good Christmas present for Katie. It probably _was _a Christmas present for Katie." _Bernard thought as he started getting his clothes on, _"Now that I think about it, I should make Katie a Christmas present. I know it's four days after Christmas day itself, but it would still be a nice gesture." _

"Katie and Bernard seem to be getting along nicely. I'm glad that you let this go through, Santa. Though that curve of you sending a _boy_ down here threw me off a bit!" Katie's father told Santa as he was making French Toast. He always got up extra early, just naturally, and made breakfast. Santa was sitting in one of the chairs in the kitchen, looking as if half of him didn't like this idea much, and half of him thought this was an amazing idea.

"I'm not so sure that this was entirely safe, Marcus, and I'm not talking about them sleeping in the same room." Marcus snorted, "I have the divider set up so it's like they're sleeping in two separate rooms."

"Yes, but Mother Nature told me at the recent meeting about Frost and Melody." Santa's voice trailed off as Marcus let his arm holding the spatula drop to his side.

"Sorry," Santa added, feeling awkward.

"You didn't do anything wrong. No one can change the past." Marcus said, beginning to flip the French Toast in the pan again.

"But we can change the present! It wouldn't be so hard to cancel everything now. Bernard came to me when he found out that he had been chosen, wanting to back out-"

"But, obviously, you refused then. Tell yourself the argument that you told him that he couldn't back out."

"Yea," Santa nodded, quickly, "I see your point, but that's not the only thing. The reason Mother Nature told me about Melody in the first place was because I'd taken Jack in at the North Pole." The plate of finished pieces of French Toast dropped to the floor. "On a sort of probation-like set-up."

"Ah," Marcus answered, just standing there, ignoring the spilt food on the floor. "Well, that's none of my business. The North Po-"

"Marcus, you know perfectly well that this is 100% your business! I was going to bring Bernard back before

he found anything out about M-"

"Considering how much Katie is like her mother, I would be surprised if he already knows that she's a half-elf. I _would _be surprised if he knew about her mother's background. _Katie_ doesn't even know about that." Marcus laughed, nowpicking up the French Toast he dropped.

"Then the best course of action would be to leave him where he is." Santa sighed, getting up from the chair. "He'll stay here until the end of the year, as planned. Or we find out if Jack's really shaped up or not." He laughed as he got up and grabbed his coat, which was hanging on the back of the chair. "Probably gonna be the first one."

Marcus snorted again. "You have a good sense of humor. The other one didn't, unfortunately. It was one of his faults." He looked up from the mess he made on the floor. "See you soon, Santa. Watch out for Jack. He can be really tricky."

"Thanks." Santa turned away, starting to walk down the hallway that led to the living room. Marcus turned back to his clean-up job. "Marcus," Santa said, stopping halfway out of the room. "Take care, okay? For Melody's sake?"

"Yes sir." Marcus whispered, but when he looked up again, Santa was gone.

"_I just _have _to find a present for him! But the ones I'm finding just don't seem appropriate!"_ Katie thought as she pushed the game room door open. Shelves full of books and board and computer games, and the bean bag chairs strewn around the room greeted her, as usual.

"_Hmm…" _Katie shifted her weight to her right foot, and rested her chin lightly on her right hand as she scanned to room for _something _that would make a good present.

As she scanned the room, a small angel statue that was placed on one of the topmost shelves peeked down at her with spring-green eyes like her's. It caught her eye quickly, as it was wearing a pale blue and very flowy dress and had curly golden hair which stood out greatly against the dark deep brown of the wood around it; in it's hand was a large (for the statue), closed, and red-brown box in it's hands.

Katie rested her gaze on this small statue and just stood and stared at it for a minute. Then, very slowly, as if walking through water, Katie went towards the shelf. Standing on some of the lower levels, she reached up for the angel. Holding it firmly, as not to drop it, yet at the same time, very gently, as to avoid having it break in her hand, she pulled the statue down. Getting back down to earth, Katie held the angel in her hands, then tenderly opened the box in it's hands. It played a tiny, frail, but very pretty and uplifting little melody. The angel was a music box.

"_The last one Mom made before we went on the beach trip. She promised to make me one like this. She never got to it. All because of that freak snow…" _Tears welled up in her eyes, making the figure in her hands seem fuzzy and blurry. Carefully placing it in one hand, she wiped her eyes with the other, and looked back down at the angel. It was still playing the soft and very sweet melody on the tiny music box inside. It never needed to be wound up, as if by magic. Her mother had shown her how to make beautiful music boxes like this, but never was able to show her how to make one of the magical ones, like this one was, that never needed winding up.

"_I found the perfect present."_ Katie thought, gingerly taking the angel out of the room with her.

"_Almost…no…wait…there. Perfect!" _Bernard thought, putting the last bits of ribbon on the wrapped box he held in front of him. _"Good thing I brought those gears with me accidentally. I hope that she'll like it. It'll be the perfect present!" _He put the box down on the bed, triumphant at his work of art. The box was a medium sized present, wrapped in pale yellow wrapping paper, topped with a shiny red bow. There was a small, similarly red card under the bow that red in green letters: "To Katie, From Bernard".

"Creek!" the door was suddenly opened, making Bernard jump. Katie hadn't come back for a full hour and a half, giving him plenty of time to make his present for her. Turning to see who had entered, he blushed deep red again, now in a position he would have expected to blush in. Katie was walking in, pushing the door open backwards, holding her clothes bundled up in her arms, wearing only a pink towel around her body. Her blonde hair now looked dark brown, almost matching his, dripping wet, leaving her bare shoulders shiny.

"Peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinner reconciled, Joyful- oh!" she was singing a Christmas carol under her breath, and as soon as she saw that Bernard was awake and looking at her with a shocked expression when all she was wearing was a bath towel, she froze.

Nobody moved for a complete minute. Then Bernard gathered himself together first, and mumbled, "Sorry, I uh-"

"Don't be. It wasn't your fault. I was the one who forgot to close it before I left. Can you help me pull the divider out? It's easier to push back in than to pull out," Katie laughed, dropping the clothes, bundling up the towel to hold in one hand. Then she grabbed the divider with her other hand. "Um…okay," Bernard answered, trying to concentrate on the divider and not Katie's towel as it was slipping off. Because of this, he accidentally grabbed Katie's hand. Bernard's cheeks then beat their previous record on how red they could go.

"Think you've got it?" Katie asked, the mischievous grin she wore so often appearing on her face.

"Y-yea. Yea, I think so."

"Good," Katie slid her hand from underneath Bernard's.

"_Wow, this _is _hard to pull out!"_ he thought, starting to push it with his shoulder, ignoring how close his and Katie's faces were together.

Just as they were about to seal themselves off, Kate looked up and said, "Bernard," His head shot up quickly._ "Great! Did I mess up again?" _"What?"

"Red and gold." Katie answered with a smile, before pushing it shut the final few inches.


	6. Sorry

I'm putting this on haitus...sorry...I'm gonna be writing another one, in the same mythos, but with different characters. Katie won't be in that one. This will still be in the back of my mind however...bye


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